Winner of the Rockower Award, the highest honor in Jewish journalism, this blog contains random musings of a journalist, father, husband, son, friend, poodle-owner, Red Sox fan and occasionally-ranting rabbi, taken from Shabbat-O-Grams, columns, speeches, letters, sermons and thin air. "On One Foot," the column, appears regularly in the New York Jewish Week, as well as a blog for the "Times of Israel."

Wednesday, September 10, 2014

The Hebrew word dor, generation, appears often in the Bible as well as in Hebrew prayers, particularly in the form of dor l’dor or dor va-dor, from generation to generation. The idea of transmission of our tradition from one generation to another has resonated to the point where that itself becomes a prime Jewish value - even eclipsing for some the content of that tradition itself. A claim can be made that simply to transmit a body of knowledge, belief or practice to the next generation, without regard for the content of that body - is unsustainable. But in the post Holocaust era, where so many questions cloud the future of Judaism and the Jewish people - questions both theological and demographic - and at a time where change is so frenetic, it makes some sense simply to keep the fires burning for another generation or two in the hopes that at some point in the future those questions might be answered. Intergenerational transmission is especially powerful for Jews because to a large degree, immortality is measured not in the survival of the individual soul, but in the survival of the Jewish people as a whole. A great example of this is the Passover Seder which includes the invocation that “in every generation (b’chol dor vador) all people (not just Jews) must see themselves as if they had experienced the Exodus from in Egypt- or on Hanukkah, when we sing in “Mi Yemalel,” “In every generation a hero arises to save our nation.”

The expression “dor va dor” has given rise to some great songs, including this one by Josh Nelson:We are gifts and we are blessings, we are history in songWe are hope and we are healing, we are learning to be strongWe are words and we are stories, we are pictures of the pastWe are carriers of wisdom, not the first and not the last

L'dor vador nagid godlechaL'dor vador... we protect this chainFrom generation to generationL'dor vador, we will praise Your name

Looking back on the journey that we carry in our heart

From the shadow of the mountain to the waters that would part

We are blessed and we are holy, we are children of Your way

And the words that bring us meaning, we will have the strength to say

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